Hades Moon, Demeter's Daughter

Hades Moon, Demeter’s Daughter

Unable to die, (no sharp instruments lie by)
When the moon is full and I have fallen, weak, upon my knees,
Painted upon myself Grief, orange, red, black, instead
Torn at my hair, and rubbed charcoal madly about my staring eyes,
down my cheeks; I gather the Objects,
Sacred only to me, to beat the drum of my despair,
I draw ancient symbols on my face, my hands, my skin,
A forgotten language decipherable
Only to the guardians at some ancient gate, then
As the Gods allow, or the Moon, or Pluto himself ordain,
I take another step down,
down the stone and winding stair.

A sister priestess, her purple cloak about her hidden keening face,
Beckons me, Lifts up her slender hands and pours into my opened breast,
That deeply drinks, bottomless thirst, of a holy water that knows,
A holy water that reaches, flows, finds the wounded, wordless place,
Dances fire, baptizes the heavy knotted roots,
Holding up its diamond-true, still mirror .

The purpled dark reflection contains All Power,
Collapses stars into black holes,
Births worlds, splits atoms, the mother's heart

in two like a pomegranate cracked, marbled veins full,
Thick grief revealed, congealed,
Tracing a sluggish path through the quicksand

Circle of loss, the caverns of the heart exposed,

labyrinths of sorrow.

Alchemical match, from dross gold flash, a thin thread grasped,
And Death's hand opens. The high priestess, embodied robe
Of poetry, breathes Water-Fire-Earth-Air verse,
Softly blows the healing tinder,

flames the broken Mother-heart with Spirit, until it burns
The solid matter.

Steadily the fire soothes my leaking

heart and body; licks the blood fruit clean

bids me lie upon the hearth, I do.

I lay cold here on the fired iron slate.

Cold, so cold, before its warmth, its red

dancing promise, a promise I don't yet see,

Whispering only "Persephone,"

"Persephone."

Kelly T. copyright February 2009 revised and copyright March 2009